The librarian clicked something on her screen and I was legal again. Hooray!

I tested it by renewing the book I have been reading: The English Hymn A Critical and Historical Study by J. R. Watson. Of course, the used copy I have ordered arrived in the mail as well. I am find Watson’s history and analysis of hymns to be very valuable. It has helped me see the historical significance of many hymns included in the Hymnal 1982. I have been writing little notes in my Hymnal 1982 Companion. Mostly I am simply cross referring it to Watson’s more lucid exegeses. Very cool.

I was listening to Bach and Beethoven this morning as I made coffee and cleaned up the kitchen a bit (my usual morning ritual enhanced with music since Eileen is away and there is no danger of disturbing her with my tunes), I was wondering about how people listen to classical music these days.

Could it be possible that the logic of music is something that many fail to apprehend, opting instead for fleeting moments of emotion and sensuality?

I do know that it’s often easy for me to doubt that the music I make in church is being noticed much less enjoyed or understood.

Nevertheless I persist because I do love making music, the more excellent it is the better.

I also love learning about shit on the internet. Case in point:  recently I ran across a reference to Bach’s Feet: The Organ Pedals in European Culture by David Yearsley (mentioned in my Aug 30th post). So I interlibrary-loaned it. Yesterday I gathered another bunch of Christian Romances (emphasis on the Amish) for my Mom and also picked up my copy of the Yearsley.

As I was reading Acknowledgements in it, I was delighted to discover that a new book was coming out about Mendelssohn and the organ.

A little poking around and ta da! I now have requested a copy of it.

I continue to think that Mendelssohn and a pretty underrated composer. Although after my cynical morning musings, maybe very few people are paying much attention to any of this historical stuff any way. I’m glad to be among them.

I also ran across this book in an Organ Historical Society email. Yep. Interlibrary loaned.

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Bob Dylan at the Capitol Theater in Port Chester, N.Y. – NYTimes.com

This sounds like an interesting concert.

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An Ex-President Back in the Limelight – NYTimes.com

Letters to the editor. I liked the one signed by twenty prominent people including Gary Hart, Jennifer Granholm, Jim Hightower, Norman Lear, Ron Reagan, Robert Reich, and Eliot Spitzer.

This sentence struck me as true:

In America, you can’t love your country and hate your government, since we are the government.

Recently I have actually offended (something that’s pretty hard to do) by the Facebook page “I pledge allegiance to my country but not my president.” Followers I know include people in our military. Sheesh.

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Cleaning Up the Economy – NYTimes.com

Since I’m being all biased and shit here’s a link to an excellent Paul Krugman article. Example quote:

“Now, you may have noticed that in telling this story about a disappointing recovery I didn’t mention any of the things that Republicans talked about last week in Tampa, Fla. — the effects of high taxes and regulation, the lack of confidence supposedly created by Mr. Obama’s failure to lavish enough praise on “job creators” (what I call the “Ma, he’s looking at me funny!” theory of our economic problems). Why the omission? Because there’s not a shred of evidence for the G.O.P. theory of what ails our economy, while there’s a lot of hard evidence for the view that a lack of demand, largely because of excessive household debt, is the real problem.”

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